


We Go Forward

by BigBloodyShip



Category: Snowpiercer (2013)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Character Death, Referenced cannibalism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-18
Updated: 2014-07-18
Packaged: 2018-02-09 09:20:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,498
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1977504
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BigBloodyShip/pseuds/BigBloodyShip
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Curtis decides then and there that he will never let anyone or anything ever try to take Edgar away from him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	We Go Forward

**Author's Note:**

> So I watched Snowpiercer last week and I have a lot of feels about Curtis and Edgar! Although the Curtis/Edgar relationship here isn't strictly romantic, you can read it that way if you want. 
> 
> Unfortunately, I realised too late that the format of this fic seems a bit like that of [Coming Through in Waves](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1880478/chapters/4050978) by [flying_one](http://archiveofourown.org/users/flying_one/pseuds/flying_one), but I assure you the plot is quite different! (That fic is great, though, and you should check it out as well!)

When Edgar is a baby, Curtis can’t bear to look at him.

Whenever he looks at that tiny infant, swathed up in some old and dirty rags, he sees everything he hates and fears about himself. He sees a murderer, and it makes him sick to his stomach.

Edgar is the loudest baby he has ever heard. He screams and cries, day and night, no matter what anyone does. Curtis tries to block out the sound, but he can’t. The baby’s cries are shrill and accusing.

_You killed her, you killed my mother, you would have killed me, too._

These are the words he thinks he hears those screams melt into at the edges of his fitful sleeps. He can’t stop it and it’s driving him mad. He covers his ears and tries to think of other things, but there it is, that baby's screams echoing and reverberating inside of his skull, and it won't stop.

“You should take care of this child,” Gilliam tells him one day, “It will be good for both of you.”

Nobody else will take Edgar. He’s too noisy, too much trouble. And Curtis finally forces himself to man up and hold that baby in his arms because he owes him and his dead mother that much.

Edgar stops crying.

Maybe he is doing this as some form of penance, but he finds an odd sort of solace in caring for this baby that he’d nearly killed and eaten in a moment of ravenous desperation. Food is still scarce at first. Baby Edgar looks so thin and pale in Curtis’ arms. He doesn’t know if he can forgive himself if the infant dies.

One night, Curtis rolls up his sleeve with grim determination and holds a knife to his arm. Edgar needs to eat, he thinks, Edgar needs to eat, or he will die. He presses the blade downwards into the flesh, and it hurts so much that he’s shouting as blood wells to the surface.

He can’t do it. There's too much pain, far too much for him to bear.

He’s a coward, such a goddamn coward. He cries from the shame of it. “Don’t worry about it, my boy,” Gilliam tells him later as he tends to his bleeding arm, “You’ll need two arms to take care of that baby, anyway.” But it’s of little comfort.

As if by some sort of miracle, protein blocks are introduced the next day. They are slick, rubbery black blocks of an unknown substance that taste neither good nor bad. Curtis doesn’t want to think about what would have happened if the protein blocks had been brought out a few weeks later. Everyone would be desperate again. There’d be no more self-sacrificing. People would be back at each other’s throats, and someone would tear baby Edgar out of his arms and kill and eat them both.

He mashes up protein blocks and wraps them in a cloth with a small hole cut into it and feeds Edgar like that. At night, he holds him tightly to his chest and does everything he can to make sure that baby is safe and warm.

By the time Edgar is one, he has uttered his first word.

“Curtis.”

Curtis acts embarrassed, but secretly, he is so proud and so happy. Baby Edgar seems thrilled by his new ability and keeps saying Curtis’ name over and over again like a mantra, _Curtis Curtis Curtis Curtis Curtis._

He begins walking, too. At first he is unsteady and can barely stand upright for a few seconds before he falls back down. Curtis holds his hands and gently guides him up and down the carriage until he can toddle about by himself. 

When Edgar is two, he realises that he can run.

At first, he doesn’t run far, only a few metres at a time before hurrying back to Curtis’ side. But before long, he’s always running about, always on his feet, and he begins to get himself into all sorts of mischief. Curtis is at his wit’s end trying to keep Edgar away from other peoples’ bunks and out of their things.

One time, Edgar is running down the carriage - for no apparent reason, as small children typically do - and he trips and falls. His knee is bruised and he scrapes one of his elbows raw. Curtis panics, but Edgar doesn’t cry like Curtis thinks he will. Instead, he stubbornly grits his teeth against the pain.

Tanya patches Edgar’s elbow up in no time, and he’s back to running around and laughing and shouting soon enough.

When Edgar is three, some old books are sent down from the front of the train on New Year’s Day.

It’s some sort of rare treat for the tail end passengers to convey Wilford’s benevolence. But Curtis knows better. Wilford is no kindly keeper of the engine. This is to lull the tail end passengers into some false sense of security, to make them think that Wilford gives a shit about them.

Nevertheless, Curtis digs through the pile and finds an old storybook.

At night, Edgar curls up next to Curtis on his bunk, and Curtis reads aloud to him. They’re mostly silly little stories about talking animals, but Edgar loves them and is fascinated by the illustrations. He points excitedly at the drawings of trees and animals, the sky and the sun. He starts asking a million questions a minute about what they are, and why aren’t there any on the train? Curtis tries his best to answer, but how do you explain the sky to someone who has never been outside of this metal sardine tin before?

He thinks about how Edgar will never feel the sun on his face, and it makes him strangely sad.

When Edgar is four, he starts receiving lessons from Gilliam.

Some of the train children - those lucky ones, who, like Edgar, have survived the horrors of those desperate, hungry times - gather by the old man’s bunk once every day like it’s some sort of cramped little schoolhouse. Gilliam teaches them letters and numbers, and Curtis’ heart swells with affectionate pride when he is told that Edgar is a fast learner, bright and clever and eager.

Gilliam has the children read from a book of fairy stories salvaged from last year's New Year gift bestowed by the merciful Wilford, and Edgar will excitedly recount these stories to Curtis as they are eating their protein block dinners. All the stories end the same, of course - the hero saves the day and everyone lives happily ever after.

“Gilliam says anyone can be a hero,” Edgar informs Curtis between bites, “I want to be a hero someday. Just like you, Curtis.”

“I’m not a hero,” Curtis tells him, but Edgar blithely chooses to ignore this.

_I’m not a hero. I’m not who you think I am._

When Edgar is five, a woman and several guards come down to the tail section and demand that all of the children assemble for a medical inspection.

Curtis knows that it is not a medical inspection. He’s not sure what, but something feels wrong, and he pushes Edgar behind him, concealing him as the woman and the guards walk by. That was the beginning of the “inspections,” and they were not as thorough in those days. Curtis supposes they are lucky in that respect. Nobody notices the little boy hiding behind him.

Two children are selected to be led away, off to fates unknown, and Curtis decides then and there that he will never let anyone or anything ever try to take Edgar away from him.

When Edgar is six, he finds a playmate in Grey.

While Edgar is loud and boisterous, Grey is silent and stern with a look that suggests that he is wise far beyond his years - Curtis thinks he might be younger than Edgar, but he seems so much older.

Edgar doesn’t understand why Grey won’t speak. At first, he doesn’t mind. Then, he asks Curtis why Grey never says a word, and honestly, Curtis has no idea, so he can’t give the curious Edgar the answers he wants.

Edgar is always trying to coax Grey into talking. He tells him jokes, offers him his protein blocks, and asks him questions. But Grey remains as tight as a clam and never utters a single word.

Finally, Edgar becomes too frustrated with Grey’s silence, which he still doesn’t understand and probably never will.

“Why won’t you talk!?” he screams at him, “If you won’t talk to me, then I won’t talk to you, either!”

Grey doesn’t answer. He just gives Edgar a look as hard as flint. After that, Edgar stops playing with him. He never speaks to him again, either.

When Edgar is seven, his words become absolutely filthy.

One time, Edgar hits his head on the side of a metal barrel, and out from his little mouth comes an indignant cry of “Fuck!”

Curtis is horrified and bewildered. He has always taken care to mind his tongue around the kid and has no idea where he could have learned this horrible word.

“Where did you hear that from?” he asks Edgar angrily, “Never say that again, you hear me?”

Edgar promises that he won’t say it again, but he has always been a stubborn child, and before long, he swears enough to put a sailor on shore leave to shame. Curtis implores him to control himself, but to no avail.

Tanya jokes that he swears so much because he’s swearing for both himself and for Grey. Secretly, Curtis wonders if Edgar’s grudge against Grey has anything to do with it, but decides not to think about it too much.

When Edgar is eight, he falls ill.

There is something going around the tail section, some strange sickness that renders its victims weak and helpless before swooping in to snatch their lives away. Three people have died already, and more are sure to come.

Curtis does everything he can to make sure that Edgar doesn’t catch the illness. After all, children are much more susceptible to those sorts of things. He doesn’t allow him to play with other children, or to go to his lessons with Gilliam anymore. Whatever the illness is, Curtis is sure that it is contagious, and with their limited resources in the tail section, there is no telling whether or not he will be able to do a single thing to stop the illness should it try to take Edgar away.

But Edgar gets it anyway, despite everything Curtis does to protect him. He burns with fever and is wracked with coughs. He shivers and sweats and struggles to breathe.

There isn’t much they can do for him, but Curtis is at his side always. He doesn’t sleep and makes sure Edgar is warm and comfortable and drinking plenty of water. Gilliam gravely tells Curtis that he doesn’t think that the boy will survive and that he should prepare for the worst, but Curtis refuses to listen.

Curtis isn’t sure if he believes in a god anymore, but he prays and prays, _Please don’t take Edgar, please don’t take him away from me, I’ll do anything._

Edgar is stronger than everyone thought. He fights the illness with everything he has and he conquers it in the end. Curtis nearly cries with relief.

When Edgar is nine, there is a riot.

Curtis doesn’t take part because he doesn’t want to think about what will happen if he is killed in it.

Edgar is growing up fast, but not fast enough. He still needs Curtis. There will be nobody to look after him if Curtis dies, and he will be alone on this godforsaken train. Curtis can't let that happen. 

The riot fails. So many people are killed.

Edgar can’t quite comprehend what has happened, but he is clever, as Gilliam said, and is beginning to understand that there is a world outside of the tail end, and that it is worth fighting and dying for.

When Edgar is ten, he starts telling Curtis that he wants to rebel against “them.”

“Them” is, of course, the guards, Minister Mason, that yellow-coated woman who takes children away. Everyone in the fabled “front of the train.”

“I can fight them,” Edgar says, “We can fight them together. You, and me, and everyone else here. We can fight them and beat them.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Curtis tells him.

“I don’t want protein blocks anymore” Edgar persists, tugging on Curtis’ sleeve, demanding his attention, “I want a steak. Andrew told me about steak. He says they have it up there, at the front of the train.”

“Shut up,” Curtis snaps, “If one of the guards hears you talking about this sort of stuff…”

“Don’t you want something more?” Edgar cries in frustration, letting go of Curtis’ sleeve abruptly, “Don’t you want something better?”

“Of course I do!” Curtis shouts, “I want it it every goddamn day!”

“Then why don’t you fucking do anything about it!?”

Curtis slaps Edgar across the face as hard as he can. Edgar is knocked onto to the floor with a yelp of pain. He looks back up at Curtis, eyes wide, and nose bleeding. The bewildered and betrayed look on his face feels like a knife in Curtis’ gut.

“I hate you!” Edgar screams, “You’re a coward, Curtis, a fucking coward!”

Curtis watches dumbly as Edgar flees, running off and disappearing into the mass of people and metal and filth. He shouts after the kid, begging him to come back, but he doesn’t even look back. He spends the rest of the day searching the carriage for Edgar, but can’t find him. No doubt he has found himself a clever hiding place that he knows Curtis can’t reach.

And anyway, Edgar is right. He is a coward.

He hates himself for losing his temper and hitting Edgar. He doesn’t know what had compelled him to do so. That night, as Curtis lies awake on his bunk, he suddenly feels like he hasn’t come that far from holding a knife over a baby after all. It is a sickening thought, and he nearly makes himself vomit.

Finally, long after everyone has gone to sleep, Edgar sheepishly reappears.

“I’m sorry,” he says quietly, “I’m sorry I called you a coward. You’re not.”

“I’m the one that should be sorry,” Curtis answers, “If I ever do that again, you hit me right back, OK?”

“OK,” Edgar says agreeably, and Curtis is relieved to see that he is smiling.

“Come here,” Curtis tells him, patting the space on his bunk next to him, “Come sleep next to me.” Edgar eagerly climbs up and settles himself comfortably against Curtis’ chest. Curtis drapes an arm over him and thinks back to when Edgar had been but an infant. He’d been so small in his arms.

“Curtis, what does steak taste like?” Edgar asks as Curtis ruffles his hair absently.

“I’ll tell you in the morning,” Curtis promises. Even despite his curiosity, the kid’s eyelids are already drooping. “Get some sleep.”

“You’re not a coward at all,” Edgar mumbles sleepily, “You’re going to be a hero one day. I know it.”

When Edgar is eleven, he sees someone getting killed.

They are arranging themselves in rows for the daily headcount, each row obediently and quietly sitting down when they are told.

All but one. A man leaps up without warning, screaming something unintelligible before lunging at one of the guards. He grabs the guard by the throat, and the guard is yelling and flailing, until two other guards rip the man away and beat him with the butts of their guns. The man is screaming with each blow, and the sound of bones cracking echo throughout the carriage as everyone else cowers, too shocked and afraid to do or say a single thing.

Curtis tries to cover Edgar’s eyes, but it’s too late. Edgar has already seen the mass of blood and brain and bits of skull that was once that man’s head.

The boy is silent, his eyes wide and fixed on the battered and bloody corpse. Curtis sees his little fists clench at his side and can almost feel the rage that is burning bright within that young body.

When Edgar is twelve, Curtis accepts that he is no longer a child.

Being a train baby does that to kids, he supposes. They grow up faster than they should have to in a hostile world. It makes them strong and brave.

And when Curtis looks at Edgar, he can tell that he isn’t afraid of anything - not even the thought of dying for the right cause.

When Edgar is thirteen, Curtis starts teaching him how to fight and how to defend himself.

He wishes he doesn't have to, but he knows that there will be a day when they will all have to fight, and that this day will come faster than anyone can anticipate. He wants Edgar to be ready when that time comes, no matter how much he wants to keep him out of harm’s way. He knows that regardless of what he does or say, Edgar will fight when it comes to it, and it won’t be his place to try and stop him. Besides, he can only keep protecting Edgar for so long.

Just like at Gilliam’s makeshift school, Edgar learns fast and is eager to keep going. He is quick on his feet and and uncannily skilled at dodging the punches that Curtis throws at him when they practice. He knows how to see an attack long before it comes, and although he isn’t anywhere near as strong as Curtis yet, he gets better every day.

Edgar practices enthusiastically. Whenever Curtis is busy, he occupies himself with a punching bag of sorts made from scraps of cloth and all sorts of miscellaneous pieces of rubbish sewn up into an old coat.

He channels all of his pent-up rage and discontent and yearning for the world of those storybooks he had loved when he was a toddler into these practice sessions. He is becoming more and more ruthless, more and more determined.

Curtis tries not to think about the fact that it won’t be long before Edgar is capable of killing another man.

When Edgar is fourteen, he asks Curtis, “How did you get that scar on your arm?”

Curtis wants to tell him the truth, but he can’t. Just like how he couldn’t make that sacrifice, how he couldn’t cut off his arm to feed that starving child.

Instead, he fabricates a lie. “It was a long time ago,” he tells Edgar, “I was stupid when I was young and got into a lot of fights. This was from one of them.”

Edgar seems to buy the story, and he is fascinated by the scar. He admires it and thinks him brave for it.

Curtis is disgusted with himself for his dishonesty, and for letting Edgar think that he is a brave man, when he is in fact everything but.

When Edgar is fifteen, Curtis tells another lie.

“Did you know my mother?” he asks, “What was she like? How did she die?”

“I don’t know,” Curtis makes himself say, “I never knew her.”

Why does he keep lying? Edgar deserves so much better than this. But Curtis is scared of the truth and he is scared of the man he had once been - the man who had murdered an innocent woman and would have killed her baby, too. And that baby is standing in front of him now, grown into a youth full of admiration and affection for him.

He looks at Edgar, and he sees the spitting image of the woman he had killed with his own hands when he was seventeen years old; the woman with Edgar’s same rusty blond hair and grey-blue eyes.

He sees her face in his boyish features and it’s almost too much to bear.

_I did know your mother_ is what he should have said, _You look just like her, and I killed her._

One day, he will tell Edgar the truth, he thinks. But that day will not come any time soon. It will be quite a while until he can summon the courage to do so.

When Edgar is sixteen, whispers of another revolt begin to propagate.

The tail end is thirsty for it. Curtis can feel it in his blood. It thrums within his entire body, hot and potent. Now is the time to start preparing.

Edgar doesn’t leave his side as he and Gilliam stay up all night making plans. A revolt might be spontaneous, but a revolution is not so simple. It needs coordination, it needs time, it needs thought, and it needs the cooperation of everyone involved.

Curtis doesn’t like Edgar hanging around him all the time like that as they make their preparations, but Gilliam thinks that his enthusiasm and eagerness to help is a good thing. They give Edgar tasks, like keeping the other tail section passengers up to date on the latest developments in their plans, and he carries these tasks out swiftly and faithfully.

Edgar reminds Curtis of a greyhound, straining for the start of the race, itching for action. It makes him nervous. Edgar is clever and strong and unwaveringly loyal, but he’s hotheaded and too easily excited. It could mean trouble.

But before long, Curtis realises that he can’t do this without Edgar. He needs Edgar at his side. It makes him feel brave and reminds him that he has someone to fight with and for, someone who believes in him so fiercely that it makes him think that maybe this revolution can succeed after all.

When Edgar is seventeen, the revolution begins.

Although it has already been under way for a year now, the gears really kick into motion when Curtis receives the first of those cryptic messages scrawled on small slips of red paper.

Edgar takes his place at Curtis’ side. He falls in next to him so naturally, like this is where he was born and raised to be. And in a way, Curtis supposes that is true. He can’t imagine anyone but Edgar there, and nobody can take him away.

They will do this together.

And then they fight, side by side. Curtis takes both of them onwards. 

When Edgar is eighteen, he dies.

Curtis is fighting his way forward, swinging his axe left and right. There is blood splattered across his face and hands, and all around him, people are screaming and dying. Edgar is somewhere behind him, no doubt holding his ground valiantly and ferociously against their attackers. Minister Mason is on the ground, Grey’s knife embedded in the back of her leg. Now is Curtis’ chance. He surges forward towards her prone form with the energy that he didn't know he still had, and then -

_“Curtis!”_

Curtis falters and turns when he hears Edgar screaming his name. His breath catches in his chest when he sees Edgar in the hold of one of Mason’s thugs - Franco the Younger, he thinks his name is. The burly man is shouting something, his hand gripping Edgar’s hair and jerking his head back to expose his throat, a knife pressed against the vulnerable flesh. Edgar struggles, but it’s apparent that he isn’t getting anywhere.

His eyes are wide as he stares at Curtis, and he looks so helpless in the hold of Mason’s henchman. For the first time that Curtis can remember, Edgar looks afraid. He looks like a child again - the child Curtis had raised - and Curtis remembers that he is young, so goddamn young, too young to be fighting and too young to die.

Vaguely, Curtis remembers that his name was Edgar’s first word, and now, he realises, it will also be his last.

_Go,_ something in Edgar’s eyes say, as scared as they are, _Go forward. I trust you._

He has a choice. It is either the revolution, or Edgar.

Curtis chooses the revolution - hisrevolution, the revolution he has been waiting for, the revolution he has started, the revolution that he has been planning for months. 

It is the right choice, he thinks, the choice Edgar would have wanted him to make. But that doesn’t make it hurt any less. His chest feels like it is being seared open as he turns away. He cannot bring himself to watch. He can only go forward.

He can't watch as Edgar twists away from Franco the Younger, just for a moment. He can't watch when Edgar stares wide-eyed after Curtis’ retreating back before the blade slides between shoulders and into his heart. He can't watch as Edgar crumples onto the ground, eyes still and resigned.

Edgar doesn’t make a sound as he dies. He is scared - everyone is scared in the face of death, no matter what - but he accepts Curtis’ choice. He knows it is the only way to go forward. And that makes him brave despite his fear - brave to the very end, Curtis thinks bitterly. His brave and loyal Edgar. Braver than he could ever dare to be himself.

Franco the Younger might have been the one who killed Edgar, but Curtis knows that the man with the knife will always be himself. Edgar almost died as a baby because of Curtis’ hunger. And now Edgar is dead at eighteen years of age because of another kind of hunger, a hunger for something more than protein blocks and a squalid metal box. It is cruel and ironic and Edgar doesn’t deserve it. It was supposed to be so different from this, they were supposed to reach the front, they were supposed to seize control of the great engine, they were supposed to make better lives for themselves and all of the other tail section passengers, together. Edgar was supposed to always be there at his side and no-one was ever supposed to take him away.

_We go forward_ , he thinks as he runs towards the front of the carriage where Mason lies shrieking, _We keep going, Edgar, and I’ll see you again one day, and I’ll tell you the truth. I’ll tell you everything, I promise. I'm not a hero, but somehow, I will find the courage be that man you have always thought me to be. I will be that man for you. I will finish this thing we've started together, I will finish it for both of us. You'll have your steak and you’ll see the sky and you'll feel the sun and you'll know the truth._

In front of him, the revolution continues. Behind him, Edgar is dead - just like countless others before him, and countless more to come - ripped viciously out of Curtis' arms and eaten whole by his revolution.

_I am the man with the knife,_ Curtis tells himself, _I am the man with the knife, and I am going forward._

**Author's Note:**

> I saw Snowpiercer only once, so I can't remember whether or not they said the year that the first riot took place. I decided to have it occur when Edgar was nine here, but I'm not sure about the validity of that! And finally, I decided to make Edgar eighteen at the end because I sort of like to think that New Year's Day is his birthday. They didn't explicitly say it was in the film, of course, but I remember Edgar complaining that he hates getting old after everyone shouts "Happy New Year!" which made me think of that...
> 
> I'm not too happy with the ending because I'm terrible at wrapping things up, so I'm really sorry about that! I also apologise that the whole "When Edgar was (age here)..." thing got sort of tedious after a while, I'm not sure what made me think it'd be a good idea to write out every year...


End file.
